B E A U TI L I T Y
MAKE GOOD CHOICES
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ometimes you don’t need to decide—sometimes that’s a good choice. But it may be a better choice to make a bad choice. Every mistake is a teaching opportunity. Indecision and doubt weaken the process, while problems can force us to be creative and make something better for the next choice. How does this relate to design? Creating, making, and managing choices is essentially what design is about. Designers, by definition, must literally make a lot of bad choices. Working through bad ideas, getting lost, and hitting dead ends is testing the limits. How else can we arrive at the good ones? For the designer, choices have two aspects: On a personal level, designing is choosing. On a team level, the designer manages the development process of choosing the choices. The design process is a conversation between people and between needs and reality. Designers need to hear all the voices to navigate the rough interpersonal waters innovation generates. Like Meat Loaf sang, designers are constantly asking, “What’s it going to be?” Right now, bad choices are stacking up like dirty dishes in the sink. Disapproval hurts. The world feels overwhelmed with deep systemic problems on every level, all with an abundance of hard choices. How do designers help manage the change they are creating? Lao Tzu says, “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.” Like a funky drum beat that keeps the music moving, the design process keeps development moving, and designers’ soft skills manage each step. Steering the options and guiding the process takes just as much talent and creativity as creating new designs—and is just as necessary for success.
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